Winterhawks skate past T-Birds, 5-0

The Portland Winterhawks shut out the Seattle Thunderbirds 5-0 Monday night at the Rose Garden in Portland.

The T-Birds are now 8-9-1-0 in the annual New Year's Eve game against the Winterhawks.

The T-Birds travel to Kamloops to take on the Blazers at 7 p.m. Friday before returning home on Saturday to face the Spokane Chiefs at 7:05 p.m. at the ShoWare Center.

Right wing Keegan Kolesar made his T-Birds debut Monday night. Kolesar was selected by the T-Birds in the first round, 20th overall, in the 2012 Bantam Draft.

Portland (32-5-1-0) opened the scoring at 12:41 of the first period when Paul Bittner scored. Brendan

The Winterhawks outshot the T-Birds 13-6 in the first period.

The Winterhawks took a 2-0 lead when Brendan Leipsic scored an unassisted shorthanded goal at 9:32 of the second period.

Portland extended their lead to 3-0 when Oliver Bjorkstrand scored on a breakaway at 19:58 of the second. Taylor Leier sprung Bjorkstrand with a long pass from the Portland zone.

Seattle (16-19-2-1) outshot Portland 14-11 in the second period with the Winterhawks holding a 24-20 advantage in total shots after two periods.

Nic Petan scored a five-on-three power-play goal at 11:08 of the third period to give the Winterhawks a 4-0 lead. Leipsic and Troy Rutkowski were credited with the assists.

Portland's fifth goal came when Taylor Peters scored on a breakaway at 15:01 of the third. Bjorkstrand and Leier had the assists.

Portland outshot the T-Birds 19-11 in the third period and 43-31 in the game.

Seattle goalie Brandon Glover stopped 38 of 43 shots and his record is now 15-15-2-1.

Portland goalie Mac Carruth made 31 saves to get the shutout and improve his record to 18-2-0-0.

T-Birds single game tickets for the 2012-13 season are available online at the T-Birds website and at the ShoWare Center box office. The ShoWare Center Box Office is open Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Saturday game days at 10 a.m. and Sunday game days at noon.

T-Birds season tickets are on sale. Season tickets can be purchased by calling the T-Birds office at 253-239-7825.

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